To Cross the Bridge of Death
by Swordchucks
Summary: Ginny Potter mourns the death of Harry at the end of the war. Hermione finds a way which might allow them to change the past, but the cost is great.
1. Prologue: Caveat Emptor

**To Cross the Bridge of Death**

**Prologue: _Caveat Emptor_**

Prophecies don't come with a warrantee or an instruction manual. They are the ultimate example of _caveat emptor_, "let the buyer beware". That isn't to say that there wasn't some use in them, but some of them are just flat out wrong. Others were altered during their course by the participants, and never really came about the way the prophecy outlined it. Most were simply unclear and either provided no useful insights or lent themselves to misinterpretation. Even among the accurate ones and concise ones, none would give the full story.

"Either must die at the hand of the other…"

That's what this one had said. It seemed clear in some ways, but it definitely failed to give the full story.

At the age of 25, Harry Potter had faced the Dark Lord and killed him in battle. The prophecy said that would happen, so to that extent it was true. The prophecy promised that he could not live while Voldemort survived, but it never promised that he would live. After the Dark One was vanquished, the Death Eaters surviving the fight had been consumed in agony as they were consumed by their Dark Marks. In their resulting throes, they thrashed about with magical power as much as with their physical bodies and it was this that resulted in Harry's death by bringing the ruined castle down on his head.

Of course, the prophecy could not be faulted since it had not been Voldemort that had killed him, but rather the death throes of his minions. The prophecy hadn't lied, but it hadn't told the whole truth, either.

For her part, Ginny Potter had been forced to watch from afar. Her husband had frozen her in place and thrown his invisibility cloak over her, an echo of another death, to keep her safe while he went down to finish the battle. She knew that he had been uncertain of the outcome, and he was often seized by a need to protect her. It was the same need that almost tore them apart a decade before. They had reconciled… well, he had reconciled. In her mind, they had never really broken up. The boy had just been stubborn and stupid. It took her eight years from there to get him to marry her, but he had.

Some Muggle-born wizards and witches often wondered why there was no such thing as divorce or remarriage in the magical world. In fact, the concept was completely foreign and few ever questioned it because of the very nature of a magical marriage. When a couple said their vows over a wand, it bonded them permanently together. The bond provided some security by giving each spouse a sense of the other's condition, but it was also a burden in its own way. Even death could not sever the bond, which was why few would even consider attempting a second marriage and bonding, not that many wanted to.

Ginny was well accustomed to feeling that Harry was struggling for his life or in mortal peril. What she wasn't accustomed to was the feeling of breaking within her as she rushed to the scene of the carnage. She knew that Harry had won when she saw the Death Eaters overcome with the backlash of their Dark Marks, but she could no longer feel him through the bond that they shared.

By then, other allies were Apparating to the scene, including Ron and Hermione who had taken charge of the Order in the last few years being among the scant survivors of it. Together, they unearthed Harry's body and only then did it truly get to Ginny that he was dead. She felt as though half of her soul had been ripped from her and screamed her anguish.

Days later, her grief had not abated, though it was quieter. They buried Harry beside his parents, and Ginny felt that a large portion of her had been sealed inside the coffin with him. After that, she lapsed into a deep depression and it fell to Ron to take care of her. He had Hermione were married by that point, as well, and the pair shared Ginny's grief, though not as pointedly.

For five years, the red haired girl did little but move despondently from one day to the next. She began to dream about her own death so that she would, once again, join the man she loved. She had aged considerably in those years, going from youthful lass to a haggard matron and skipping all of the steps that should have been in the middle. She could think of little outside of seeing her husband again.

In the meantime, Ron had made sure she was cared for, even while he and Hermione had rebuilt Hogwarts and brought it to life once more. They were the only Weasleys to survive the war, and he could not refuse her or bring himself to be harsh with her. As the school was completed, Ron had taken over teaching flying and Hermione moved between classes as an expert in many fields. For those five years, Ron tried desperately to bring his sister out of her malaise, with little success. Finally, it was Hermione that had the answer. She was one of the brightest witches of her own or any age, and there were ways to harness magic that had never been fully explored. Using her Muggle-born instincts for innovation, she set off to do that.

When she presented the answer to Ginny, the young widow came around quickly and began to prepare. The wages of the war had been heavy. The magical community in Europe had been all but decimated, and a scant few of their friends had survived. Changing that was impossible, according to convention, but what Hermione was researching wasn't exactly conventional. The older witch thought she'd found a way to meddle with time, and Ginny didn't have to ask any questions to know that if anyone was going to be sent back, it would be her. There's no way she would take no for an answer.

The magic would only be possible if the spell were completed at one precise moment in time, the instant that Ginny had been born on her forty ninth birthday. That left nineteen years for her to prepare, and prepare she did. To cast the spell, whatever form it might take, she would need to have power. A lot of power.

To gain it, she left England and traveled to the deepest parts of Africa where she learned tribal chants and the art of fetish crafting. In the Middle East, she picked up something of astronomy and the crafts for creating enchanted rugs. In India, she spent time with monks who showed her how to protect her mind by becoming one with nothingness. In China, she traveled with skinchangers, who inducted her into an order older than the animagi that spoke of spirit animals and taking the shapes of other beasts through their heart's blood. In Japan, she was inked with magical tattoos and learned many esoteric techniques. Australia saw her to the outback where she learned of the dream walking art as old as the continent itself. In between the human realms, she spent time with the goblins and the merfolk, learning their ways and magic as well as with many smaller tribes of creatures, some of which had gone undisturbed by humans for centuries.

Each place had many other arts to offer, of course, but she quickly discovered that there was an element of heritage associated with most. For instance, in Japan, many of the magi could call upon the spirits of their surroundings to take material form. Ginny tried to learn the art, but it was impossible for one who was not of the people whose worship brought the small gods into being. There was also physical combat, which she picked up in bits and pieces. It was highly useful for dealing with Muggles and even for some wizards and witches. There was magic for enhancing that, as well, which she learned.

The most interesting of all places, however, was the United States. In stark contrast to Europe, pureblooded magicians were a rarity there. Because of this, the magical world existed almost on top of the world of the Muggles, and magic was tailored to work well for those with relatively little power. Ginny found that there were hundreds upon hundreds of small spells to be learned there, and though each was very specialized, it was also highly efficient. Unfortunately, the Yanks lacked a coherent magical culture and actually finding a way to learn the spells was tricky.

When she was forty five, Ginny felt she was ready and returned to help Hermione finish the spells and rituals. On the night before her fourth ninth birthday, Ginny had almost finished the spell. In a few hours time, she her age would be seven years seven times and it would be the most acceptable moment for the spell to complete. She had to do it alone and it was complicated and had already gone on for four days. There were potions and scrolls and runes to be used, and though she was weary, she pressed on.

She felt the sweat beading on her forehead as she forged ahead, trying to get the chanting complete in time for the moment of her birth. She knew that she was dead, whether or not the spell worked. That had been one of the conditions of the magic, that after the first five hours I would be impossible to stop. The spell would use the gateway of death itself to send her soul back to another time when she had gazed upon the gateway of death. As the last word was said, her back went rigid and she slumped forward, lifeless.

When Ron and Hermione found her, they didn't know whether or not her spell had worked. In fact, that was something they would never truly know, because if she succeeded, it was likely that their world would simply cease to be. Ron teared up at the sight of his dead sister but knew that she had been lost to him twenty years before when Potter had died. He held on to his wife and whispered, "Even if she fails to save him, I hope she beats some sense into us. I can't bear the thought that something might happen and we'll never have…"

Hermione nodded and kissed her husband lightly, echoing his fears and wanting to hold on for as long as possible.

OoOoOoO

Ginny moaned softly as she awoke and put her hand to her forehead to stop the pain. Her eyes fluttered open and she sat up only to see the dead basilisk and a young Harry Potter in bloody robes heading for her. "It worked!" she cried, immediately forgetting about her pain. "Harry, it worked! I'm back and now you won't have to die and everything is going to be okay and…"

Relief and the aftereffects of the spell hit her and she sobbed uncontrollably. "Harry, I'm so sorry. Everyone else was dead and it was horrible and..." she sniffled and struggled to her feet. Harry reached out a hand to help her and when they touched, there was an odd sensation as though a coil that had been wound too tightly suddenly sprang free.

She had no time for further thought as she was suddenly overcome by agony. Harry apparently fared no better as he fell to the floor beside her, writhing. She gasped out, "Harry… I'm… sorry…" before she lost consciousness, trapped in a world of nightmarish pain.

OoOo End Prolog oOoO

**Author's Notes: **I have a bad habit for long author's notes, so bear with me. This being a prolog, I'm not going to talk much about what is actually going on, but I think I need to make a few things clear right away. The "mind time travel" topic has to be one of my favorite fic themes. I wrote Sailor Moon fics using it way back in 1998, though I've since seen it done as well or better. I've never been overly interested in the HP fandom until after I read HBP. That book really "did it" for me and inspired me to start delving.

This type of fic was one of the first things I looked for and I was pleasantly surprised to find both _Harry Potter and the Nightmares of Futures Past _by Viridian and _Harry Potter and Fate's Debt_ by intromit. Both of these are excellent fics and well worth reading. I will admit that these two fics are probably going to have an influence on what I'm doing and where I'm going, but this fic will definitely be different from both of those. There will be a few similar themes between this fic and NFP, and it'll be obvious in the next chapter what I've taken as inspiration from Debt.

Finally, I'd like to thank Jaybird for being my beta reader for this chapter.

I'm posting this fic to three sites (this one, Sink Into Your Eyes - siye, and Fiction Alley). All three should be updated at the same time when new chapters are available (though I understand that Fiction Alley has an inherent delay in the form of the queue), so feel free to follow along on whichever chapter you wish.


	2. Chapter 1: Truth and Consequences

**Author's Notes: **Well, here is where we see if I can maintain the interest you guys have shown in the prologue. I have to add _Meaning of One_ by Sovran to my list of fics with a similar theme. Also it needs to be added to my "list of stories I'm probably going to accidentally borrow from". All of them (and this story as well) can be found on SIYE.

It should be clear, but thoughts in this fic are done like _'this'_ but are otherwise handled like spoken text.

I think my divergence from similar stories should become obvious with this chapter. Nyeshet gets credit for a minor plot point in this chapter that helps things along.

Thanks goes to Jaybird yet again for betaing. I would like a second beta and possibly a britpicker, if anyone likes the story enough to volunteer. **Disclaimer:** Harry Potter Publishing Rights © J.K.R. Note the opinions in this story are my own and in no way represent the owners of this site. This story subject to copyright law under transformative use. No compensation is made for this work.

* * *

**To Cross the Bridge of Death**

**Chapter 1: Truth and Consequences**

"Harry!" she screamed as she ran down the steep slope, slipping and sliding on the scree near the base. It was the type of hill for which the phrase "climb down" would be much more appropriate than "run down", but by some miracle, she kept her footing and ran on. Ahead, the sonorous rumble that had accompanied the collapse of the ancient castle was still echoing and many of the mossy stones still rolled as gravity forced them to settle into new homes.

She could tell that she was running and that there was more going on, but it felt like time somehow moved ahead, and there were suddenly other people around her. She recognized her brother and Hermione, but many of the others she did not know. Each face, however, was contorted in grief and she looked down to realize that she was cradling the bloody and lifeless body of Harry Potter in her lap, though he looked strangely different from the Harry she had come to know.

"No… NO!" she screamed and sat up forcefully, ripping away the shroud of sleep. Her small hands gripped fistfuls of the bedding, and she found crisp but heavy linens beneath her fingers. The dream receded and took with it the darkness in her mind. She realized that her breathing was deep and labored, as though she had just run a long distance. She blinked her eyes several times before she cleared the haziness away and she could make out the dim shapes of nighttime in the Hospital Wing of Hogwarts.

"Wha…" she managed as one of her hands went to her head instinctively. The last thing she remembered was fighting against the diary, against Tom Riddle, and then she'd been pushed down deep inside herself. She shuddered weakly at the thought of it and how dirty it had made her feel when he did that to her. But the last thing she remembered was also chanting an impossibly long spell in a small dark room. Even stranger, the last thing she remembered was rushing to the side of the crumbling castle in her dream, though now it didn't seem quite as dreamlike as it had moments before.

Somehow, she knew that she and Harry had been married in that dream, and even as she did so she remembered their wedding. Even as weakened as she was, she blushed in the darkness at the thought of the Boy-Who-Lived actually doing something like that with her. He only thought of her as his friend's kid sister, after all, and doubt seized her again. She wished she could tell Tom about it, but no, she couldn't talk to Tom. Tom was really a bad man. She didn't know what had happened to him, but she really hoped that Harry hadn't found out about what he'd been making her do or any of the horribly embarrassing things that she had written to him. Apparently, the ordeal with the diary had left her with all sorts of crazy dreams that seemed a little too real.

She relaxed back on the bed, feeling much the worse for wear as she slowly settled in again. For some reason, the name Ginerva Molly Potter floated across her mind before she drifted off and she fell asleep blushing as the memory of the wedding came floating back to her.

OoOoOoO

Ginny dreamed again, though this time it was a much stranger dream. Harry was the right age again, and he was holding the diary, though something had made an icky black hole right through the center of it. Then she started speaking in the dream about all sorts of crazy things before they touched and she was overcome by pain.

She woke up feeling quite drained, though she felt certain that it was at least a little better than it had been in the middle of the night. Whatever had happened, she'd survived, and that's all that really mattered. For a while, she lay there, simply thinking of nothing as someone on the edge of exhaustion is prone to do.

Eventually, Madam Pomfrey bustled in and gave her a few reassuring words as she checked Ginny over, though she didn't answer any of the questions Ginny had about what had happened. Instead, she simply supplied, "The Headmaster will be down to explain things to you in a little while. I'll let him know that you're awake."

As she lay on the hospital bed, feeling the crisp linens with just a hint of starch that rustled at her every movement, odd things started to float through her head. She kept thinking about things which couldn't have happened. She remembered giving Harry a horrid singing get well card as he was resting up after having been attacked by dementors, but that didn't seem right. Ginny had never seen a dementor in her life, or had she? She certainly had enough memories of the vile things, though they all seemed slightly odd.

It was as though she were remembering vivid representations of stories that someone had told her. If Mr. Weasley had managed to get a telly working in the Burrow, she might have compared them to shows that she had watched years ago. She knew the outline of events clearly, but only parts of it really seemed real to her. Other parts were just hazing and indistinct.

She considered these strange images for a while, but could come up with no real answer. It might have been caused by Tom, or she might have gone really barmy on her own.

After what felt like an eternity, the aged Headmaster did, in fact, come down to see her. Looking upon his flowing beard and wizened face, she was briefly reminded of a white tomb sitting beside a lake and a song of unbearable sadness. How or why those things would come to her mind, she didn't know, but there was a feeling of infinite loss associated with them. Then, she remembered seeing a giant comforting a crying Hagrid, which made even less sense.

Dumbledore looked her firmly in the eye when she met his gaze and she felt something light brushing through her mind, though she hadn't realized that there was such a thing as "through" when it came to minds until that moment. It wasn't unpleasant, though it reminded her somewhat of a fingertip skimming over the top of a pool of water. It almost tickled.

"You look well enough, Mrs. Potter. I'm amazed that you have recovered so quickly, after all that you have been through," he said, his not unkind but also with a stiff backbone to it. "Still, I'm sure you would have had a good reason to meddle with those types of forces."

Ginny had been afraid that something like this were going to come up. She knew that Tom had been making her do… things. She'd strangled the school roosters and she'd written those things on the walls. She knew that, though she couldn't remember actually doing it. It didn't take a genius to figure them out, however, given all of the evidence. However, she feared that Tom had made her do something far, far worse when he'd taken her over at the last. The crushing weight of her guilt was such that she didn't even realize what name he had addressed her by. "I didn't mean to, Professor Dumbledore. I just… I was lonely and afraid and he… Tom Riddle got into my head through that stupid book and made me do those things. I'm really, really sorry."

Dumbledore seemed to relax ever so slightly as this explanation spilled out. He continued, though some of the edge had faded from his voice. "No, child, not those things. While your role in this whole Chamber of Secrets affair is not to be ignored, Tom Riddle has tricked many wise and powerful wizards. I would not blame you for that."

His face softened a little more as he spoke. "No, there is something else. We found you and young Mr. Potter on the floor of the so-called Chamber of Secrets with a dead basilisk some three weeks ago. You were both in an indescribable amount of pain and had we not found you when we did, you might not have survived it. When we got you safely out of that foul place, we found that there was a badly distorted piece of magic connecting the two of you. We did what we could to remove the distortion, but I fear that doing so was not without its consequences."

Ginny barely followed what the man was saying. "I… I had a dream about that… I think…" Even as she said it, it came back to her as more than just a dream. It was another of the half-there memories that seemed to fill her head. "I've been remembering a lot of things like that… but it's like a memory, but only half of one of something…"

The Professor, however, ignored her confusion to ask a question. "Ginny, how old are you?"

"How old am I? I'm eleven. Twelve this coming August," she replied, confused by why he would ask that question. Then, something else clicked and she recalled something he had said. "Wait, did you call me Mrs. Potter before?"

Dumbledore sighed softly and appeared to deflate a little. "Yes, Ginny, I did. Tell me how old you were when the two of you were married?"

Ginny blinked in surprise and was about to protest that they were no such thing when the answer came spilling out of her mouth, "I was twenty-three and he was twenty-four. Ron gave me away at the wedding, though it was really just half a dozen people so there weren't many choices." Her hand went to her gaping mouth in surprise. "When did I… what…" Her mind raced at the implications, even though she'd had the hazy recollection in the middle of the night before. '_Me and Harry? We actually got married! I thought he'd never notice me!'_

"I think we need to start from the beginning if you are to understand what is going on," Dumbledore suggested softly. Ginny waited as he conjured up a chair for himself and settled down on it. He fumbled for his pipe, but thought better of it and just started talking. "This is going to trifle hard to believe, and I fear that much of it is supposition and conjecture, but please hold your questions for a few moments.

"Have you heard of time travel, Ginny?" he waited patiently for her to give a hesitant nod before going on. "Well, time travel is something quite tricky and nearly impossible. There are ways to reverse a small amount of time, but they are dangerous and often do not work in a way that would be beneficial for actually changing the past. Actually going back in time more than a few hours is thought to be impossible by most sane wizards. All previous attempts have simply resulted in the death of the wizard or witch casting the spell and it's thought by many that if these spells did succeed, it could well destroy the fabric of causality, which is a very important part of reality.

"However, from a purely theoretical perspective, it might be possible. No, now I know it is possible, because I believe a future version of you found such a spell and used it. What could possess you to do so…I will not venture a guess, but I'm sure it was a good reason to you at the time."

"The prophecy cheated us," Ginny interjected. She'd been trying to stay silent and had, for the most part succeeded. However, the same part of her that had answered the questions about the wedding was answering this one. "'One must die' it said, but both died. Harry killed Voldemort, but that bloody bastard's minions did in Harry. It wasn't fair. I was going to fix it. Make sure that it worked out the right way. Mione made the spell for me, and it was suicide, but I didn't care."

Even as she spoke the words, she knew that what she said was the truth. The castle falling and the dead Harry floated to the front of her mind. She shuddered at the memory of it, but she knew that if there was a reason she might have sought to change the past, that one would certainly qualify.

Seeing grief and confusing bubbling up in the girl, Dumbledore pressed on. "You have the potential to become a very powerful witch, Ginny, and apparently you did. However, there was something you must not have counted on. When you touched Harry Potter in this time, the marriage bond attempted to repair itself. Because the Harry of this time is not the same as the Harry of that future time, I'm afraid that the junction was imperfect and it could well have killed you both"

"Fortunately, young Ronald managed to summon help before the damage was too great. We did what we could to fix the mess, and Mr. Potter has made a full recovery. I'm sorry to say that much of what must have been the future version of you did not survive the ordeal. If it's any consolation, that version of you would have erased the mind of the girl I'm talking to now, so things are not all bad. However, there are a lot of that other you still in there. Ask Madame Pomfrey for a mirror in a while and you will see what I mean."

As there was finally an opening in the conversation, Ginny immediately filled it with a question. "Why did you call be Mrs. Potter?"

"Oh… well, you see…" Dumbledore stumbled, for once at a loss for words. "Marriage bonds are not things to be taken lightly. We were able to untangle the interference in yours, but the bond is still there. You and Mr. Potter are married as truly as any couple can be said to be married."

If such a thing were possible, Ginny's face flushed a red as bright as her hair. "What's… what's going to happen now?"

"Well, you have missed the Express back to London, so other arrangements will have to be made. Are you aware of the method used for protecting Harry during the summer? The rites of shielding amongst blood relatives?"

Surprisingly, Ginny nodded her head. She actually was familiar with them, as it was a topic that she had studied in Africa. '_When did I learn this stuff?'_ she wondered to herself, but then she knew. She remembered walking across the southern plains as they edged on to the Sahara and learning from the medicine men and the tribal shamans there.

"Well, we have a most interesting exercise to undertake. I fear that the wards will not stand up well to having Mr. Potter being married. If the two of you stay close to each other, however, the wards might not notice that Harry has been wed and will hold. I will have someone stationed nearby to do daily checks on the protections, but it will also fall on the two of you to stay together at all times."

"Wait… what? I'm going to stay with those awful Muggles and Harry?" she asked. Somehow, she knew how awful they were because she remembered Harry telling her about them. "What about Mum?"

"Your mother is most upset about this, Ginny, but I have convinced her that if Mr. Potter is a target, then you have become a part of that same target. You will return to the Burrow on Harry's next birthday, which I am pleased to say is only a month from now."

Ginny's gaping mouth and furious blush made her look like nothing so much as a bright red fish. "I'm going… Mum is going to kill us."

The Headmaster laughed softly, "I'm sure it won't be as bad as all that. Mrs. Weasley is well aware that nature of a marriage bond defies being hidden. She cannot change that, and I expect that by the time you see her next, she will have calmed down considerable."

"Professor, I… I just remembered something. When you came in, I thought about a big white slab by the lake and a really sad song. It was your funeral, Professor. Snape killed you," she added the last in a small voice as she remembered a fragment of the grief her former self had felt on that day. "And that's not all, Harry's going to get attacked by dementors and the Tri-Wizard tournament is going to be a trap and Voldemort is going to come back."

If Dumbledore was surprised by these things, he hid it well. He did not, however, stop her from spilling out all of the most dangerous events that her future self had seen at her four remaining years at Hogwarts. Some of them surprised her and more than one brought tears to her eyes as she recalled a particularly painful incident.

Dumbledore took it all in and when she was finished, spoke once more. "Mrs. Potter, I thank you for telling me all of these things, but I would caution you not to share this information with anyone you do not trust implicitly. Also, you would do well not to trust the future now to play out the same way as your memories tell you, because your other self has already changed things in a very significant way by coming here."

Just then, there was a faint knock on the door and Ginny felt an internal twinge. '_Harry?'_ she thought.

"That would be Mr. Potter. He has been awake for a few days now, and is ready to leave. As soon as you are, we will make sure that the two of you get to Privet Drive and get settled in. Now, I must be off to make a few arrangements… I would encourage you and Mr. Potter to talk for a while. I know that this must come as quite a shock to the pair of you."

A few minutes later, Dumbledore had left, replaced by Harry Potter. He pulled up a chair and sat beside the bed, looking sheepish and awkward and she kept pulling up new memories of him. The two of them fighting each other with words and fighting Death Eaters with magic. The two of them laughing and joking. The two of them on their wedding night.

She pulled the sheet up over her face at the sheer embarrassment of it all. "I'm so sorry," she whimpered.

"Ginny… I… It's all right. The… accident kind of left me with a couple of memories that must have come from some other me," Harry said, obviously not sure how to handle this situation. "Dumbledore said it must have been part of the bond. There are only two bits of it, but I remember our wedding and… I remember killing Voldemort and what happened after that. I guess it was the days when the bond was formed and the day when it was broken."

Ginny's mind twisted and roiled. If he remembered the wedding, that was one thing, but she violently hoped that he did not remember the wedding night. She would likely die of embarrassment if he did. "I'm sorry, Harry, I don't think I… the future me… knew that this was going to happen this way. I think she… she just wanted to see you again." The fact that she was talking about herself in third person seemed almost natural now, though she wasn't quite sure what to make of all of this time travel stuff.

"She worked really hard to come back here, Harry, but she didn't know that the wedding oath was going to react like that. I think… I think she was a little mad with grief. I mean, really gone mad. She worked for _years_ to get ready to come back here and 'fix' things and I don't think she questioned some things as much as she should have."

'_Why am I so embarrassed',_ she asked herself. In her mind's eye, her future self's relationship with Harry played out and she got the general shape of it. _'If I can manage to be myself, he'll like me._' However, knowing that didn't help as much as the fact that she knew it would eventually work out that way. After a little bit of internal turmoil, she lowered the sheet and could look at him and talk at the same time. Before, she wouldn't have been able to do that much because of the unbearable weight of her crush.

Even after only a few hours of sorting through her new wealth of jumbled memories had taken that crush and broken it down to its bones. She knew that she would build something else on its smoothed foundation that would be real and lasting, just as her other self had done.

To her surprise, Harry started talking to her. That was something he had never really done before. "Ginny, I have to apologize, too. I don't care what happened, but no one deserves to have to live with the Dursleys. Not even the Dursleys, really, but that's their own faults. I'd say we should just run away to the Burrow, but I'm quite afraid that your Mum will kill me. Unless Ron does it first. I can't think he'd be all that pleased to learn that we've gotten… well… you know."

For the first time in what felt like forever, Ginny giggled. "They're probably going to want to. But Professor Dumbledore's going to work on them. There's no way out of a marriage bond, which is why they're usually so hard to make."

He reached out and touched her hand lightly and she felt a warmth blossom with her breast. Her mum had once described the feeling to her when she was little. When a married couple touched, they could feel, faintly, a general idea of the emotions of the other. When they weren't touching, they might get flashes of very strong emotions on occasion, but when they were touching, it was much more frequent and it worked for softer emotions. It was the same feeling she'd had in her breast all morning, she just hadn't realized what it was until that moment.

"Harry, please don't hate me," she said, her voice becoming strained again. "I didn't mean to trap you or anything. I had a crush on you, and I mean, I kind of dreamed of you liking me back, but I wouldn't have done something like this to you against your will. The me from the future… well, I don't think she would have been upset about this, but I don't think she would have wanted to force it on you, either." As she spoke, tears started rolling from her large brown eyes.

Harry, seeming to know what to do but still being a little awkward with it, wrapped his arm around her shoulders and gave her a light hug. Her hands went up and pulled him to her closer and the hug deepened. He patted her long hair and made soothing sounds as she cried. She was crying not only over the thought that she might have committed a horrible betrayal to Harry, but also for every death and for every unhappy moment she'd come across in her mind. There were some terrible things there, including the death of most of the Weasleys and many of her friends.

After what felt like an eternity, Harry spoke again. "Ginny, it's okay. I know you aren't at fault in any of this. That other version of you… the one that went mad… she did this, but she did it out of…" he stammered as he came to grips with the truth, "… she did it out of love. I guess. I mean… Yeah.

"Look, I'm sorry for being a bit of a prat this year. I can see from those two visions I had how much I loved you… I mean, how much the future me loved you. Or will love you. Or… however that works. What I mean is that if I can come to feel that way about you, any me, then you must be the right girl for me. I just haven't realized it yet." He pulled back from her a bit and gave her a reassuring smile, which made her heart melt. He shifted and shortly the two of them were both sitting on the bed, though Ginny was under the sheets and Harry on top of them. "What do you say we start out as friends? I really don't know much about you, aside from what I've heard from Ron and I doubt you want me knowing you on only that basis."

Ginny mustered a grin and a half-hearted giggle. "No, no I don't." Her mind and heart had been wrestling overtime to figure out, exactly, what she felt. They'd come up empty, but she had a flash of inspiration. "I had a horrible crush on you ever since I was little. I think that's pretty much gone now, because I know a lot more about you, though I haven't had time to really process most of it yet. I care about you and I think I fancy you, but I think that's about all I know for sure. It's not like we don't have time… the only way to break the bond… well, there is no way to break the bond between us. So, yes, let's be friends."

A feeling in her chest drove her on to say something that, a year before would have been impossible. "Do you suppose we could, maybe… I don't know… do you suppose we could be boyfriend and girlfriend now instead? I mean… take it really slow, but kind of, you know, make that commitment."

Harry laughed even as he blushed. "I suppose so. Yes, that will be all right. I mean, technically, I could call you my wife and it'd be true."

Ginny let out an "eep" and pulled the sheets back up over her scarlet face as he said it which only caused Harry to laugh harder. "Harry James Potter, you stop teasing me or I'll show you why Fred and George don't pull pranks on me!" Harry stopped talking and grew very quiet and, after a few seconds, Ginny nervously lowered the sheet. "Umm… Harry?"

Harry was looking in her general direction, but not really looking at her. "Oh, sorry," he mumbled with a weak smile. "It's just that I didn't know my middle name was James. It makes sense, though, since it was dad's name."

"Oh, Harry!" It was Ginny's turn to hug Harry and comfort him. "I'm sorry. It was just there in my memories and I didn't realize that you didn't know..." She held him for a little while more and then, slowly at first, she started to tell him other things he'd told her about his parents. She was sure he'd probably known more he'd never shared, but she couldn't help him with those. When he didn't stop her, she went on for a fair while, including the fact that her father had been an unregistered animagus and the form he'd had.

She finished talking and offered Harry a soft smile. She'd just told him a long list of things that had taken the other him years to piece together and he had a warm smile on his face to match her. "Ginny… thank you," he said, and there were tears of happiness in his eyes as he gave her a soft hug. It was broken when Madam Pomfrey came in and ousted Harry so that she could give Ginny one more checkup before releasing her.

Some time later, Ginny was alone in the Ward, changing into something more Muggle-like for the trip to Privet Drive. She'd asked Madam Pomfrey for the mirror as Dumbledore suggested, but hadn't noticed any real differences. Her face was still the same plain eleven year old face she'd seen all her life. It wasn't the beautiful young woman face or the haggard older woman face from her memories.

Everything was normal, that is, until she was half changed and happened to catch a glimpse of her back in the mirror. There were two large tattoos of dragons coiled around her back and, as she looked, their tails wrapped around her legs all the way to the ankles. The style was simple and bright, and as she watched them in the mirror, one of them moved, coiling around the other. Above them both, at the top of her back and almost to her neck was another tattoo of a phoenix with its wings folded inward on itself and its head hidden as though it were sleeping or, more likely, waiting on something.

Ginny took one look at the tattoos and screamed. The only thing she could think was that her mother was definitely going to kill her when she saw those.


	3. Chapter 2: Dursleys and Dragons

_Author's Notes: Thanks goes again to Jaybird for doing beta on this one._

**To Cross the Bridge of Death  
Chapter 2: Dursleys and Dragons**

Ginny recovered from the shock of spotting the huge tattoos on her back slowly. She had been fairly certain that something in all of this mess was going to really shock her, but she wasn't sure what. _'I'm kind of surprised it took that long,'_ she mused to herself as she looked at gigantic serpentine creatures on her skin. _'Where did I get those great big things? Mum is so going to kill me!'_

Even as she wondered about it, another one of her other-self's disorganized memories floated to the surface. Other-her'd spent a year getting the tattoos from a master in Japan. She'd had to trade quite a lot of gold and knowledge to him for the privilege, though it was said that he was a master of the art without equal which made his work truly priceless. The process had been painful and the inks hard to obtain. The greens held a touch of specially prepared basilisk blood, the red came from the tail feathers of a phoenix, and the yellows from a type of mushroom that could only be found in certain goblin caves.

She'd had to provide the inks, as well, and she could remember parts of each quest. The gathering of ingredients had taken over half of the year, but the tattoos themselves had taken several months to complete as there were many potent spells involved in their creation. There were times in the long, painful process where she'd been forced to take time away to heal from the physical and spiritual damage getting the markings. During the forced down time, she'd learned a bit of the craft, but only enough to make the phoenix mark, which was useful for certain things that defied recollection. The dragons, however, were far beyond her limited skills with the art. How they'd followed her other-self her, she didn't know, but she suspected they were just as permanently bound to her as the bond with Harry that already had caused so much trouble.

As she thought about the fact that she could make the tattoos, she realized that she was remembering skills that she, by all rights, shouldn't have. She felt like she just needed to pick up the right tools and she could give someone a sleeping phoenix tattoo, though she couldn't find the memory of what the tattoo did or the reason she'd gotten it, no matter how much she thought about it. _'Oh, well,'_ she decided as she gave up on chasing down the errant information. _'I guess I'm just going to have to deal with having holes like this. If only I didn't get the feeling that what I can't remember is so important... Not just the tattoo, either. There's something big there, too…'_

Of course, she couldn't remember what she couldn't remember. Otherwise, she would have remembered it and made the whole question moot.

Her search through other-her's memories didn't produce anything on the phoenix, but it did let her in on the purpose dragon tattoos. The tattoos, themselves, weren't the squat, bulky things that Europeans called dragons. Other-her'd seen several European dragons thanks to Charlie, and they had been pretty enough in their own way. However, none of them had been as serpentine and sinuous as the things coiled across her back and down her legs. No, the tattoos she had were of a different creature entirely. They were guardian figures, of a sort, but they also embodied great physical power. As such, they enhanced the inherent physical properties of their owner, making her stronger, faster, and more resilient.

Experimentally, Ginny decided to throw a punch and see what happened. She wasn't disappointed by the experiment. Subconsciously, she fell into something that she recalled as a fighting stance and her hand whipped out, as quickly as any serpent. As she did so, one of the two dragons shot along her arm, flowing under her skin like it was the most natural thing in the world and coiling around her arm, its head aligning with the underside of her wrist. Its movement felt like hot breath against her skin, but it wasn't unpleasant. She couldn't tell for sure, but the punch felt like it had been a really hard one.

The movement itself hadn't been caused by the dragon, though she felt certain that it had helped her with speed and accuracy. Other memories came to mind of fighting with Muggles and wizards in a number of different places. Most of the fights had been learning, but she could tell that a few had been much more serious than that. Just like the tattooing, she felt like she had retained some benefits from the other version of her.

"Wicked," she mumbled to herself, unconsciously using her brother's favorite exultation. She watched the dragon slowly returning back up her arm and couldn't shake the feeling that its eyes were watching her as it did so. Wondering what else she could do, she spun around launching herself into the air and giving three quick kicks before landing. By then, dragon had gone completely from her arm and she had a feeling that there was substantially more tattoo on her legs than there had been a few moments before.

"Double wicked," she said, slightly louder. Apparently, there were more bits of her future self left over than she'd thought. _'Not that Muggle fighting is going to help me much in a real fight,'_ she reminded herself, even though a few of those fights in her memories had seemed real enough.

Feeling a little better about the tattoos, she continued to get dressed in a pair of ratty old jeans and a baggy orange t-shirt with "Cannons" across the chest. The clothes had been Ron's when he was eight, but they fit her well at eleven.

_'If I've got all sorts of other skills coming out of these memories, maybe other-me left some spells and junk in there, too?'_ she wondered to herself. She tried to bring up a memory of a spell she didn't know, but that didn't get her anywhere. She was finding it quite tricky to come up with memories from her other self. They were mostly there, she felt, but finding out how to trigger them was tough. _'Well… maybe…'_ she considered her dilemma for a moment before hitting on an answer. _'Do I know a spell to change a shirt to something other than Chudley Cruddy Cannon orange?'_

As she thought about it, she quickly discovered that she did now a spell to do that. In fact, she knew half a dozen that would do the trick, each with varying degrees of difficulty and effectiveness. She picked the most effective one which also happened to be the most difficult and pulled out her wand. She took the shirt off and gave it three quick flicks of her wrist, just as she'd seen in the memory, and said the word. She felt the magic work and then the shirt… burst into flames.

"Eep!" she said as she looked for a fire extinguishing charm in her memories and this time went for the simplest one of the four that came to mind. This time, the spell worked, putting out the small fire before it could spread far.

She experimented for a few moments more and found that she did know spells. She knew a lot of spells. However, the ones with tricky movements, i.e. all of the really good ones, were beyond her ability to cast. She grumbled a little at this realization, but managed to mend the shirt and turn it a much paler shade of orange before putting it back on and gathering the remainder of her things.

She had a bad feeling that the martial arts thing she'd done before was going to suffer from a similar problem as her magic. She remembered how to do things, and in the case of the fighting stuff, she seemed to have reflexes for it, but she just wasn't quite practiced enough to pull it off. Of course, not many first year wizards had a lexicon of magic in their heads, so she couldn't really complain.

She looked down at her secondhand wand and realized that it could be as much the problem as her lack of true experience with the spells. The wand her other self had learned the spells with had been specific to her, hazel and unicorn hair, 10 inches. _'I'll have to ask Mum...'_ she started to think, but caught herself. Her mother didn't have the money to go replacing Ginny's wand just because it wasn't perfect.

_'Well, technically, Harry's money is my money now so I could just…'_ she thought but then stopped herself with a verbal admonishment of "No!"

_'I don't want him thinking I'm just trying to use him for his money. That'd make me a horrible person. Besides, he's only just agreed to be my b… b…'_ she let the thought trail off, a blush again creeping across her face.

However, she refused to give up that easily and made herself think the words. _'I'm a married woman for Merlin's sake! I can admit to being my h-h-husband's g-g-girlfriend. There. Was that so hard?'_ she asked herself, ignoring the tiny voice in her head that had whispered "yes" to her.

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Traveling to the Privet Drive was accomplished by the simple expedient of taking the Floo to Diagon Alley and then catching the Knight Bus to Little Whinging. Harry was surprised but happy to learn that there was a form of transportation that would take wizarding money as he didn't really fancy changing his galleons to pounds. He didn't want the Dursleys finding about his money, after all, as it'd been left there by his parents. He told Ginny that he didn't think Uncle Vernon's distaste for wizards extended to the money those wizards might have.

The Knight Bus was imperfect for reaching Muggle addresses, however, and dropped them off several blocks from Privet Drive. Harry gave her a smile and suggested that it was for the best, as the garishly colored bus appearing in front of his uncle's house would have created quite a reaction. They offloaded their trunks and began the long walk in the afternoon sun.

"So, Harry…" Ginny started. Harry put down the end of his trunk and wiped the sweat off of his brow as he paused to look at her. "I just want you to know that I'm still really sorry about all of this."

He gave her a small, genuine smile. "If you think you're sorry now, just wait till you've spent a few nights with the Dursleys. They're positively beastly. I'll be the one apologizing by that point."

Ginny giggled and grabbed his hand in both of hers, a bold action which made her whole body feel even warmer than it already did. "I'm the one who grew up to be the idiot who started all of this. So I'm the one doing the apologizing. At least for now. If you need to apologize at some point in the future, I like chocolate cauldrons and lemon drops."

Harry looked down at their hands, and Ginny immediately became self-conscious about it, dropping her grip. They stood in awkward silence for a few seconds, neither of them quite looking at the other until Hedwig hooted from her cage, calling them back to reality.

"So... umm… let's just get on with this," Harry said, his voice sounding a little strange. "If we can somehow survive the first few minutes, then it should be fine. Uncle Vernon is likely to have gone spare about having to put up with another 'abnormal child', but I suspect Professor Dumbledore has worked things out, somehow. I think my Uncle is quite afraid of him, though he'd die before he'd admit it."

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

Uncle Vernon did, indeed, have a quite large problem with the additional houseguest and wasted no time in yelling at the both of them about it. "This is a _normal_ house, Girl," he roared as the veins stood out from his neck. He seemed to have chosen to call her Girl just as he had not-so-affectionately renamed Harry as Boy. "You will keep your school and any _abnormalities_ you may possess to yourself."

Ginny cowered from him, but she wasn't really afraid. While Uncle Vernon might have been scary to a Muggle, he didn't hold a candle to her Mum in full tear. She had just seen Harry cower and felt it was the right thing to do. "And you, Boy," his uncle continued, rounding on Harry. "Whatever you do under this roof had better be _normal_ and _decent_. I don't want to know what has possessed you to bring your… pet home with you, but make sure she behaves."

Ginny could tell that Harry bristled a little at the comment, and some secret part of her smiled. Inside, of course, as smiling on the outside at that moment would have been quite bad. "Let her help you with your chores if you want. A little good hard work might take some of the _wrongness_ out of her."

Both of them acted suitably cowed and dragged their heavy trunks up to Harry's small bedroom when they were dismissed. The bedroom barely held the bed, both trunks, and two people. The bed was definitely not large enough for two, even if the mere thought of sharing it hadn't given the both of them a blushing fit, so the trunks became the second, even less comfortable bed. It would be marginally more comfortable than the floor, at least, which was the only other option.

This meant that there was very little room aside from at the foot of the bed, which meant that being in the room meant being lying down, or at least sitting on one of the beds. Ginny took one look at the sleeping arrangements and felt her face flush again. She was certainly going to be seeing a lot of Harry over the next four weeks. Far more than she'd even imagined in her wildest dreams. Not that she was still having those fanciful dreams. _'No, now my dreams get a wealth of details and facts to work from,'_ she thought and blushed even more.

"So… I'll take the trunks," Harry said, his own face quite pink. "You can have the mattress. It's not much, but it's probably better than the other one."

"You don't have to... I can take the trunks. I'm used to getting the worst sleeping spot anytime we go away for holiday," she said, not wanting to put Harry out in his own room.

He gave her a lopsided grin. "No, you're taking the bed. You're my g-g-g… we're going out and all, so I insist on showing you at least some chivalry."

Ginny laughed, but she kept her voice down enough so that no one came running to yell at them. Harry had warned her about that, though she had a feeling it was going to be hard to control herself so much. "Alright, you win. For now. Can we turn in now or do we have some horrid Dursley thing we have to do first?"

Harry leaned out the door and looked both ways before leaning back in and answering in a loud whisper, "Only thing we have to do is avoid being under foot. We'll have to be up early in the morning, though. Aunt Petunia expects the kitchen to be spotless and breakfast to be on the table before Uncle Vernon goes to work. First day back from school is always a lot of extra cleaning because they don't pick up after themselves when I'm away. At least, it was last year, anyway."

Ginny nodded and the two of them snuck to the bathroom and took turns changing. By some miracle, they were back in Harry's room without being accosted. Ginny found that she felt quite self-conscious about the long nightdress she was wearing. It was comfortable, but it really left her all but naked underneath the loose fitting fabrics. If there'd been a way, she'd have gone for pajamas in an instant, but her mum had always made her do girly things to keep her from becoming too much like her brothers. Ginny had always suspected it had to do with hoping to find her daughter a husband, but she'd never asked and by the time she realized it, her mother had been killed in the war. It was but one of her many regrets.

Harry must have seen her far away look, because he asked, "Ginny… everything okay?"

"Yeah," she replied with a nod but frowned. "I just caught myself thinking with other-me's memories. Some of the not-so-nice ones."

"I'm sorry. I have some of those kinds of memories and they sometimes get into my dreams," he said.

"I know," Ginny said but frowned again. "I mean, other-me knew. Are they bad yet? Other-me remembers you having lots of problems keeping You-Know-Who from getting into your head."

Harry shook his head, though he shuddered. "Getting into my head? You mean, like really?"

Ginny nodded, "It was pretty nasty there toward the end. You had to learn Occlumency to keep him out." Memories came flooding back and she suddenly realized that Occlumency is what she'd used that morning to keep Dumbledore out of her mind. Somehow, she'd reflexively been doing it, just as her future self would have been.

"Occlumency?" Harry asked, and Ginny realized that, with four weeks to play with, they might have a productive time after all.

"Yeah, it's… it's a way to keep a Legilimens out of your mind," she paused as another memory trickled in. "A Legilimens is a mind reader… it's supposed to be illegal, but since it's pretty hard to catch one and even harder to prove it, there are an alarming number of them running around. I don't actually know any Legilimency, but I think other-me knows a fair bit of Occlumency. Would you like for me to teach you? I mean, I can't give you real practice against a Legilimens, but I can show you the basics of it. Professor Dumbledore can help you with the practical, I think."

Harry considered this for a moment. "But won't we get in trouble? There's the whole Underage Magic thing to worry about."

Ginny shook her head. "No, this is one of the few things we can get away with. It's not really magic, anyway, it's just the art of keeping your mind empty of emotion. Legilimency relies on using your thoughts and emotions to bring out your memories. I think a really good Occlumens can show wrong thoughts and memories to a Legilimens, but other-me never bothered to learn how."

"Well, sounds like it will keep us busy. When do you want to start?" Harry said.

"Now's as good a time as any," Ginny declared and within a few minutes, they were both sitting cross-legged on the bed. "Okay, you just empty your mind and think about nothing. Don't worry if it doesn't happen immediately, it can take a while to get that part right."

Harry did as directed, though he fidgeted a lot for the first few minutes. Ginny joined him, but found that emptying her mind was as easy as filling it. It was clearly another one of the skills that she'd inherited from herself. Realizing that there was little point in meditating, she instead spent time watching Harry as he sat, eyes closed, thinking of nothing or, more likely, everything. _'I like his lips,'_ she mused to herself and was rewarded with a mental image of a passionate kiss between the two of them. For a moment, she thought she was remembering something else, but realized that this image was absolutely her own fantasy. For some reason, this made her even more flustered and she went back to meditating to keep herself from dying of the embarrassment.

An hour later, they decided to turn in and Harry put a blanket over the trunks to take some of the edge off of them before lying down. "G'night Gin," he mumbled as he drifted off to sleep. Her memories swam with other "goodnights" and she smiled broadly as she mumbled something that might have been a response before she also drifted off.

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After the first two days at the Dursleys, which had been dominated by cleaning away nine months of Dursley dirt, they had fallen into a routine. They got up early, cleaned the kitchen, made breakfast, tolerated the Dursleys, cleaned the bathrooms, cleaned the hallways, made lunch, tolerated the Dursleys, worked in the yard, cleaned up the kitchen again, made dinner, tolerated the Dursleys, and then were free to pursue their own interests. At some point during each day, Uncle Vernon also regaled them with a lecture on proper behavior.

It wasn't even dawn yet when Ginny was awakened by a soft touch on her arm. It took her a few moments to fully transition from her dream of stalking through a dark jungle to the reality of Harry's small bedroom. Harry was crouching beside her, smiling with no more than a foot between their faces. "Go on," he whispered. "Get ready and we'll get done with the chores as quick as we can. Best to keep Uncle Vernon happy."

Ginny groaned softly at his prodding, but got up anyway. She had known the whole experience was going to be rough, but the disruption of her dream seemed particularly unfair to her. She'd really wanted to see where her dream was going as she'd just gotten the scent of the most delicious sambar and was certain that she'd catch it. She shook her head to clear it away. Why she was having jungle dreams, she had no idea, but it was probably either the influence of her future self or Tom Riddle. Considering that she remembered something about Voldemort hiding in Albania, she figured that it was probably from him, but she didn't even want to guess at what it meant.

As she wriggled off the end of the bed, Harry turned back and grinned at her. "Do you always growl in your sleep?"

She shot him a dirty look and stuck out her tongue. "Not normally, no." However, internally, she had a bad feeling that she wasn't remembering something important. She got that feeling quite often.

Half an hour later, she was helping Harry scrub the kitchen from top to bottom. The Dursleys, as it turned out, were not very clean people. This went a long way to explain the amount of work that Harry had to do on a daily basis while in their "care". However, with two of them, the work went quickly and was more tolerable. Harry seemed to not be frowning, at least, which Ginny took as a good sign.

Over that first week, the two of them had really gotten to know each other. They were still nervous about some subjects, but they freely shared everything about themselves that fit squarely into the realm of "being friends". Ginny was freed by the memories of her future self, and it seemed to her that the facts of their situation had made Harry take the time to notice her. _'Of course, it's not like I gave him much chance to notice me before, what with all the running away and hiding and not talking,'_ Ginny admitted to herself as she thought about it while the two of them drifted off to sleep one night. She knew full and well how her other-self had won Harry's heart, and it had been so simple that she wanted to kick herself for not thinking of it earlier.

Physically, they hadn't progressed at all, but that was probably for the best. Despite all of her extra memories, Ginny was still almost two months shy of her twelfth birthday. Harry was just about to turn thirteen, but neither of them had actually had a relationship with anyone of the opposite sex that rose above the level of friendship. There were a few incidents of awkward handholding, but they were few and far between and mostly dissolved into giggling or awkward silence.

Things were, all in all, going quite well up until one week after their arrival. Ginny and Harry were taking a walk and taking in the early evening streets of Little Whinging. Growing up in the magical world as she had, Ginny found quite a lot interesting about walking among Muggles, and Harry was happy to indulge her. They'd had dinner, such as it was, and were free for a few hours. Some evenings, they would spend that time trying to teach Harry Occlumency, but, since they had no way to gauge his progress, it seemed frustrating to do it every night.

In any case, they had just turned down Magnolia Road and were browsing at a shop window when they realized they'd not been paying sufficient attention to their surroundings. From not too far behind them, they heard someone say, "Ain't that Potter?"

Ginny turned, her hand creeping slowly toward her wand in case the recognition had been of the dangerous sort. She didn't know why her first instinct was to expect attack, but she had a feeling that her future-memories had something to do with it. What she saw wasn't quite what she expected, but it was just as dreadful. A bit down the street, she spotted Dudley and four of his friends.

Harry, who had turned when Ginny did, hissed a warning. "We'd better get out of here. Ickle Diddikins doesn't like me much lately."

In truth, since the two of them had arrived at the Dursleys, Dudley had been quite unhappy with Harry for some reason and had gone so far as to try physically intimidation on him a few times. Ginny's glare had proved enough to head off any real violence, as none of the Dursleys were quite sure what rules she was bound under. Ginny was pretty certain that Dudley was horribly jealous of the fact that Harry was spending time with a girl. Dudley was the sort of land animal which would have had better luck sprouting wings than finding a girlfriend.

This anger, and the fact that he wasn't likely to be intimidated by a slip of a girl like her in front of all of his burly friends, meant that Ginny was very much not happy to see him. She and Harry hustled away at a fast walk and managed to get ten feet or so before the dreaded cry of "get 'em!" came up and then Harry grabbed her hand and they were both running as fast as they could.

Three streets later, they'd outpaced Dudley and his gang and took a sudden turn down a side street before pausing to catch their breath. Ginny laughed out loud at the exhilaration of it and drew Harry into a hug of shared excitement. He returned it, and they rather lost themselves in the moment until a wheezing breath announced the arrival of Dudley and his boys.

"Oops," Harry said as he let go of her. Ginny just offered him a grin until she realized that the small alley they had chosen to duck into didn't actually go anywhere. The great slabs of meat with attitudes that had chased them were catching their breath, but that wouldn't take them that long. Then things were going to get un-fun in a hurry.

"Umm… Harry. Do you trust me?" she asked.

"I… yeah, I do," he answered, and she felt something nice surge inside her chest.

"Then… I think future-me learned some stuff that might be useful here. Just… stand back and… hold my wand, please," she said as she pressed the short length of wood into his hands. She didn't know how well her remembered fighting skills would actually work, and she definitely didn't want to get her wand broken while she was finding out.

Harry looked from Ginny to the goons and back again. "Umm… okay. I'll trust you, but we might be able to talk them out of a really bad beating. I think Dudley is afraid of you."

"If this works, he's going to be really afraid of me," Ginny said with a grin. She thought hard about what it would take to take on a bunch of guys bigger than her and looked for one of other-her's memories. She'd almost run out of time when she found it and launched herself forward.

She could feel the dragons coiling around her limbs, making her move faster and with more strength than her eleven year old frame should have possessed. She was among the bullies in an instant and the first went down when she rammed her palm into his solar plexus. Her small hand went in deep and his face immediately contorted in pain as Ginny danced on to kick the back of the next one's heel, sending his feet out from under him. Before he'd hit the ground, Ginny danced on and dealt with the next two in much the same way as the other two.

It was over in an instant, and Ginny was within striking distance of Dudley. However, instead of hitting him, an action she felt was sure to bring down the wrath of the Dursleys, she gave him a deep, menacing growl which seemed odd coming from a human throat. Dudley, for his part, stumbled backwards, landing heavily on his prodigious posterior.

Ginny felt Harry's hand grab hers again and they were off, running away from the boys once more, though they were slowed by the laughter that both were fighting to contain. Some time later, they collapsed in the swings at the play park and let it all out. "That was amazing!" Harry declared. "How'd you do that, with the kicking and the punching and all that?"

Ginny regained her composure slowly and started to answer. "Oh, other-me spent loads of time in Asia. She learned all sorts of cool stuff like that, though I didn't think I'd ever find much use for it. I might be able to show you some of it if you want, though I don't think other-me ever actually taught anyone anything. I do have a… bit of an unfair advantage." She blushed, though it was barely any change from her face being flushed by laughter and running. "Promise me you won't think less of me if I show you something weird?"

Harry nodded and promised, and she held out one of her arms. Having never tried it before, she was a little surprised when willing the dragon along her arm actually worked. It coiled and surged around her arm, almost seeming to look at Harry with its baleful red eyes. Harry's eyes went wide, but she was pleased that he just muttered "Wicked" and didn't recoil.

"I have two of these, one for each arm… and leg. They stay on my back, mostly, but they go all the way from my ankles to my wrists if I let them. They're a weird kind of magic and help with physical combat. I've got one of a phoenix, too, but I don't actually know what it does. And no, you can't see that one as I'd have to take my shirt off," she finished. Fortunately, she couldn't blush any redder or she would have.

"Wow…" he said, growing thoughtful. "The other-you must really have wanted to be ready for anything. She did all of this stuff just so she could come back here?"

Ginny nodded. "A lot more than just that, too. I think I know why I'm growling in my sleep," she said. "I think I'm something rather like an animagus."


End file.
